


Journeymen

by Project0506



Series: Soft Wars [131]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: The Clone Wars (2008) - All Media Types
Genre: Character Study, Family, Gen, Star Wars AU - Soft Wars
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-21
Updated: 2020-12-21
Packaged: 2021-03-10 17:15:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,633
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28210752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Project0506/pseuds/Project0506
Summary: Fenn knows the road he's walked to reach this place.  The path forward isn't quite as clear.  A Character Study
Series: Soft Wars [131]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1683775
Comments: 21
Kudos: 158
Collections: Soft Wars Fic Exchange





	Journeymen

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CmonCmon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CmonCmon/gifts).



“I can _do it_.”

“Yeah, do it _wrong_!”

“No fighting,” Fenn sighs seconds before he knows damn well little hands would have flown.

“Yes Fenn,” they chorus prompt and obedient and a credit to their training. Or so a man might think, if he was as deaf as a damn swamptort and his single brain cell half-again as lonely. Fenn counts, silent: _ sol, t’ad, ek, cuit _1. Before he gets to _ rascht _2 and right on cue there’s a thump and a hiss and a scuffle. Hands fly anyway, as they were always going to. They just hope he doesn’t notice. Predictable as pre-flight checklists, those brats. Fenn points his grin at the fuel port and busies his own hands.

The bay chrono runs the whole length of the back hangar wall, lines the underside of the transparisteel-sided view-hall and glows its deep scarlet commands down on scuttling cadets below. The digits tick over to shift-change. The chrono tolls, deep and unmissable, and like well-calibrated machinery the cadets straighten from their various tasks and fall promptly into lines. Tools are returned directly to their racks and squad leads forward-march with alacrity.

Latemeal session, Fenn thinks. This set has been here through two changes already, a lesson and a practical. They’d be scheduled for food next. Refueling, just in time to be set upon whatever else they’ve been assigned to complete today.

They leave in regimented step, not a movement out of time. Who the kriff, Fenn wonders, decided his time was best spent training soldiers instead of warriors?

Something heavy whacks hard to the inner cabin floors behind him. There’s that special sort of guilty silence that precedes one boy deciding whether or not it’s worth it to cry, and the other how much trouble he’ll soon be in. Fenn’s had brothers, he’s well acquainted with the sound.

Fenn clacks the port cover closed loud enough to be a warning. His tibanna-stained gloves are stripped off and tossed to lay atop his tool chest, one more spot of grimy clutter standing defiant against the clinically-cold stricture of the rest of the hangar. Reminds him sometimes that there’s actual soul around here, though he’s been having to dig deeper and deeper to find it among his peers.

Ducking into the _Unbowed_ is like coming home, from the indicator light over the port paneling that never was quite bright enough, to the solid crossbar framing the hatch that’s probably the last original part in the aft bay. It’s faded just that odd sort of off, stands out dark contrast against the shiny new finishing they’re using on surfacing anymore. He taps two knuckles to it twice as he passes, for luck.

“Alright you two -” he starts but doesn’t get much further.

“I shoved him,” Jag confesses immediately and unprompted. He’s wide-eyed concerned, both arms around his brother and shushing quietly up and down his back. “I’m sorry I didn’t think it hurt that bad.”

Jet scrubs his fists furiously at his eyes. “I’m fine.”

“You’re crying!”

“Am not.”

They’re both wobbly and watery and they’re feeding off each other in an echo chamber of abject misery. Divide and conquer, before this runaway drive makes the leap to hyperspace. “Go make sure everything’s secured,” Fenn says as he unwinds the boys from each other to get a better look. He tips Jag a glance that slices right through any protest.

“Yessir.” It almost doesn’t sound petulant, even. Fenn could almost, were he blind as a swamptort, miss the way Jag still lingered a moment before scrambling off to do what he’s told.

It’s a peculiar thing to be proud of. But the stomps of boots marching in rhythm ring a constant beat through this sterile city of boys doing precisely what they’re told precisely when they’re told to.

Jag thinks for a minute, worries for a minute, then decides to obey. Fenn, the man Fenn’s become, cannot fault him. He sinks to one knee and reaches, beckoning. Jet is just as reluctant to uncurl. “It’s nothing,” he grumbles even as Fenn prods and pokes until he’s pulled skinny arms away from his face.

He’s right: it’s mostly nothing. “Got yourself a nice little bump there,” Fenn murmurs. The copper skin above his cheekbone shines its way to purple, deeper in a line right across the curve of it. Looks like he caught the corner of something in the fracas. Jet only flinches a little at the first testing brush of Fenn’s fingertip, but braces firm against the rest of his assessing.

“Yessir,” he tremors.

“That’s going to be real colorful. Not,” he teases, “the most impressive I’ve seen. You can tell Jag’s been slacking at hand-to-hand.”

Jet giggles a little. The bruise is already starting to go green at the edges, the snakes’ remarkable engineering at work. Fenn chases the color of it as it shades. “Is there something else?” There’s the barest edge of a tear in the corner of one eye, only reluctantly released to the flat of Fenn’s thumb. “Banged your arm maybe?”

“Nossir. I’m fine.”

“Uh huh. Sure you are.” He pokes the unbruised cheek. “That fine?” Pokes just slightly higher. “That fine too?”

It’s all too easy to be proud of Jet’s giggle.

“Fenn,” he whines and tries to shuffle back. “Quit it!”

“Sure, sure,” Fenn says and pokes again.

“Ughhh.”

Jet’s face is made for smiling. He struggles to not, sometimes, and the galaxy’s always a little brighter each time he fails.

“Still fine?”

“How the heck are you the adult here?”

Even his little brattish moments are cute. Fenn changes his next prod to a flick at the very tip of a snub nose and the kid giggle snorts so hard he might be a little drippy. These days though, Fenn’s the type of man who carries tissues.

“Blow.”

Jet blows, and scrubs at this nose after. Fenn flips the tissue into the recycler shoot, the whoosh of the destructor means his last vent flush finally got it back to working.

“Good. Now, are we going to be level with each other?”

“I’m fine,” Jet insists again, but looks away. “It’s just.” He sighs. Fenn waits. “I can do it. I can fly her, I know how.”

He smooths back the short little curls above Jet’s brow, and finally the kid leans against his shoulder. “I know you do, kid.”

“I only messed up in the first sims.”

“I know. And you’ve been practicing ever since.”

“Jag said -”

“ _Jag_ ,” comes a call from the gangplank, “is a contrary little bastard.”

Their final passenger ducks into the _Unbowed_ and taps the crossbar as he passes. The boys both light up incandescent.

“I _am not_ ,” Jag howls even while he grins. He drops the lid shut on their tie-down storage and Fenn’s going to have to check to make sure nothing got tangled in his haste. Later though.

The Alpha snags Jag by the middle and slings him effortless over a shoulder. “Remind me to teach you about irony,” he drawls. Jet he catches about the shoulders and hauls him up underarm just until his toes don’t reach the floor.

It’s a good day, it looks like.

“You came!” Jet laughs.

“Course. Rau’s got a guilt complex a parsec wide. He lets you little shits get away with murder.”

Maybe a good day.

The eyes that meet Fenn’s are clear, focused. Present. A little mocking but that’s nothing new.

And none of it is false or undeserved. There are two boys in the Alpha’s arms when once there were four. Maybe, just maybe, if Fenn hadn’t indulged in his pride, hadn’t bragged, hadn’t wielded stories of their competence against the Death Watch _ dar'manda _3 who disgrace _ beskar’gam  _4 as if it was a weapon he’d had any hand in forging. Maybe there’d still be four boys in the Alpha’s arms.

Fenn meets his eyes with his chin held high. He is a warrior, he will not shy from his mistakes. He is a man, he will do what he must to correct harm he causes. “Fett,” he tests.

He gets a smile, small and twisted but real.

“Spar,” Spar corrects.

Definitely a good day, then. Fenn had hoped. They come more often than not any more, but the bad days are as unpredictable as they are devastating. The ones where he sits and stares, silent accusation, those hurt. The days he thinks he's Jango Fett, those tear.

“Spar,” Fenn agrees. Today is for the boys, and Spar has made his way here. Fenn is so, so proud of him. “You think that. But really, if I let you be the disciplinarian then I have a shot at being the favorite.”

Spar’s laugh is a creaky, delighted thing. A few wispy strands of hair escape from where he’s tied it back, washed clean and brushed out neat. He’s even managed a shave today. Fenn grips his shoulder and wishes the man would allow it to be recognized. “Dream on, Rau,” Spar challenges. The cadet ornaments swaying giddily from his arms put truth to that. “Here.” He swings a giggling Jet up into a throw and Fenn has to scramble a step forward to catch him in the air. “Take the menace. I’ll keep the nuisance. Back here with me where we _don’t bully our brothers_.”

“Yes, Spar,” they chorus, and Jag doesn’t even put up token protest.

“What’s first,” Fenn prompts as they all settle into seats and Jet frowns concentration at the instrument board.

“No one’s going nowhere til everyone has their seat harness on,” he yells over his shoulder.

Fenn feels the laugh like it was slapped out of his gut. Spar cackles from the passenger row. “Sir yes sir,” he calls back.

“Alright,” Fenn allows and wipes humor from the corner of his eye. “What’s _after_ that”?

“Parking tether.”

“Good. Disengage it.”

Jet’s hands are steady: he’s run hours on flight sims, on this craft in particular. He’s memorized the processes, knows where the gauges all are and what normal reads. “Can you -”

Fenn flips the row of engine switches for now just out of Jet’s reach. “That everything?”

Jet thinks. Fenn can see the edge of worry, of wondering if the trainer asking him a question has noticed something he missed. His mouth firms. “That’s everything,” he says, full confident.

It’s earned. “Good. Get us cleared and take us up.”

He still needs to read from the summary display and consult the codes Fenn has posted under the dash for the call, but knowing that will come with practice. He only stumbles once, but corrects before anyone else needs to.

Jag makes a noise as if to comment but he’s quickly hushed.

“ _Confirmed, Unbowed_ ,” crackles the comm, nothing more. No wish for safe flight, no prayer of success in endeavors, naught but required fact and impersonal dismissiveness.

There’s no soul to this place, Fenn sometimes thinks. He sometimes wondered if he’s sold his own to come here.

“Jag,” Jet waves an arm behind him. “Call it.”

“Tails!”

A Concordian chit spins silver along the dash panel. It settles clinking to a halt, a veshok in full flower sprawled across it’s face.

“Tails,” Jet confirms.

“Yes! Let’s gooooo!”

“We would have gone anyway,” Jet whispers loudly. “But we’d have had to space Jag first to ward off the bad luck.”

“Je’kka,” Spar warns.

“Sorry.”

“Am I the one you need to apologize to?”

“Sorry Jag.”

“It’s okay.” Jag scrunches forward as much as he can harnessed to his seat and pats his brother’s shoulder. “Just go before I _wither_.”

“Stop encouraging them,” Spar snaps but he can’t manage the proper sour to his tone, just as Fenn can’t stop the pull of his smile.

“Take us up,” he repeats, and Jet obeys neatly as Fenn could himself, barely a shudder from his lady. Jet reads outputs aloud, as they’re expected to do in training so instructors know they’re paying attention. Fenn isn’t checking to see if he’s correct. He’s watching, waiting…

He sees the moment they break atmo spread across Jet’s face. Starlight pricks wonder in his eyes, the vastness of the void fills him. “Orbit,” Fenn reminds gently, and he goes ahead and engages autopilot when Jet fumbles.

“Not quite like the holos, huh?”

They can’t hear him. Jet, and Jag too freed from his harness, crush against the viewport chittering a mash of Galactic Basic and Standard Mando’a and those flicks of signs clones have made for themselves, and spaced with silences where only Jet and Jag know what they mean. Their heads bow together, noses near pressed to the viewscreen. Spread across the black like jewels, the galaxy beckons.

Fenn swallows. This. This is what Fenn wanted to give them. This is what every boy should have, if he wants it: the stars under his hands.

Jag whispers something, and Jet titters. They crush together in the pilot’s seat. Fenn monitors the dash readouts.

“Alright.” The murmur is creeps up dark over his shoulder, settles heavy for his ears alone. “You win.”

Fenn’s eyes slide closed. “Not a competition.”

He doesn’t have to see Spar’s smile to hear it twisted around his words. “Always is,” the clone corrects. “At least a little.”

“Not this time.”

The hum he gets isn’t agreement. It’s nothing more than allowing him to think whatever he will. He can. He’s not a clone. What can he say to that? He has no right to protest. Spar is a silent wraith at his back.

And then, there’s a change.

There’s a hand that drifts unsure past Fenn’s headrest, alights tentative on Fenn’s shoulder. It squeezes, just once, and the grip shakes. It disappears as ephemeral as it appeared but Fenn can read intent clear in the wash of warmth it left behind. Alpha-θ2 has no reason to believe the words of one of the Cuy’Val Dar. But he’ll try.

It is far, far more than Fenn deserves.

Spar slips between his boys, pulls one onto his lap and the other under his arm. They stare out into cosmos and share secrets under the stars Fenn vows, somehow, one day will be theirs.

He turns to give them privacy, tilts the Unbowed so the viewscreen points away from Kamino. For now, this is all he can give.

“ _Fenn_!” Jag cuts through the quiet of the cockpit. The boy bounces feet on the pilot’s seat and beams at him over his father’s shoulder. “Fenn! Did you see that?”

Spar smiles at him around his son’s excitement. He tilts his head in invitation Fenn hasn’t earned. One more kindness to add to Fenn’s debt. He accepts, a man greedy.

He slides closer, let’s Spar’s shoulder brush against his, lets the boys grab his arms too. “See what?” he prompts and their excitement carries them past words he can understand.

There’s still soul in this place, he thinks, if you know where to look. Every glance of it tempers his resolve.

He hasn’t earned it yet, this moment where Jag presses a heel to his knee to see out of the port better, where Jet presses a hand to his shoulder to balance. Not yet.

Fenn’s hand closes around a Concordian chit sitting solid and cold on the dash, the last one he was paid before he forgot what it meant to be a Protector. Spar shares moments with his two boys that should have been four, in this space where he’s clawed himself back from breaking.

Fenn hasn’t earned this. But he will.

It is a man’s duty to correct his own mistakes.

“Fenn you’re not _looking_.”

He tucks the coin away. “Alright, alright,” he laughs. “What did you see?”

Their words and bodies scrabble over themselves, over their father, over Fenn, in their glee.

**Author's Note:**

> 1\. (Condordian Mando'a) One, Two, Three, Four. Back  
> 2\. (Condordian Mando'a) Five. Back  
> 3\. (Standard Mando'a) One who has lost his Mandalorian heritage, and so his identity and his soul. Back  
> 4\. Armor. Back  
> 


End file.
